The Shadowed Legacy of the Soulless Messenger [EN]: Chapter 418

Meiya realized her revenge was futile.

As Azadin said, her father, Lord Gares, had massacred innocent civilians.

Of course, it wasn’t out of malice. It started as an accidental incident.

However, to cover up the accident, Lord Gares actively massacred civilians, and in the process, he was killed by Azadin.

Knowing this, she felt skeptical about following Zekt and chasing Azadin.

She realized that following Zekt would only entangle her in his dirty magic and lead her to commit even greater sins. So, she gave up on revenge and tried to return to her original duties.

However, she couldn’t return to her former position as a chief officer.

With the death of King Korasar and the devastation of the kingdom’s capital, Coral Sahar, by the Nagas’ attack, her place, which was essentially that of a civil servant, had disappeared.

Ultimately, with nowhere to go, she became a wandering knight and fell ill.

A vision of destruction. After seeing a vision of the world dying and being reborn, she suffered from a fever.

She had contracted Elemental Wailing [a magical illness that causes petrification and uncontrolled magical outbursts].

As her skin petrified and she began to emit magical power, she was on the verge of death, unable to do anything. Then, the forces of the King’s Church, the Northern Empire, found her and gave her a vial of angel’s blood.

After drinking it, she received a revelation and was reborn as a crimson-winged Celestial.

“What was the revelation?” Azadin asked Meiya, the crimson-winged Celestial.

“We saw a vision of destruction. The world will die and be reborn. It will be a new ideal world where everyone is happy without hunger or cold. A true paradise will come, where the will of the Great One watches over us. But before that, a blasphemous adversary will hinder the arrival of paradise and taint this world with evil, and that is you.”

“Me?”

“Yes. A blasphemous adversary. You will boast that you were chosen by God and perform miracles. But that is not the will of the Great One, but the scheme of evil demons.”

Meiya saw in the revelation that Azadin was a blasphemous adversary, and at that moment, she deeply understood it.

The fact that Azadin was right, that her father had done disgraceful things as Azadin said, had made Meiya feel dejected.

However, if Azadin was a blasphemous adversary, the story was different.

What he said was worthless, and her father’s honor was protected. Even if that wasn’t the case, the gods had allowed her to take revenge on Azadin and had even given her power.

Before, she lacked the power to do anything but follow Azadin’s words, but what if she had the power to assert her own claims?

“In the end, you only believe what you want to believe. Hey, is there any guarantee that the Great One who gave you the revelation is a real god and not an evil demon? And since when did the holy knights of the King’s Church worship a suspicious being who speaks through illusions as a god?”

When Azadin asked Meiya, she was speechless.

The laws of the King’s Church state:

Do not believe in beings who speak from the shadows through illusions and hallucinations, but believe in the divine kings, the living gods with flesh and blood.

This was a law to protect members from the temptations of the Kurt gods or the Nether’s envoys during the time when the Hybris Continent was called the Dark Continent.

It was to guard against suspicious external beings who easily created followers by speaking to individuals and showing them miracles.

That was why Azadin had been indifferent when he actually performed miracles in the past.

“Don’t be deceived by suspicious beings who approach you, saying you are special. A true miracle is not contact with a being beyond humanity. This is something that the King’s Church and the Rescue Knights have repeatedly explained to their followers, isn’t it?”

“Hmph…”

Meiya scoffed at Azadin’s words.

That’s how they teach, but it’s practically heresy.

Many people are thirsty for miracles and revelations, and isn’t Azadin also a worker of such miracles?

“The people say that you were chosen by spirits and angels. Some foolish people even claim that the heretical teachings and books you preach were written by angels or spirits. In the end, aren’t you also a false prophet selling miracles?”

“I don’t correct the public’s shallow beliefs for the sake of proselytizing, but for me, the miracle has already happened. Being born on this earth and inheriting the will for virtue and truth, people meeting and sharing good will is the real miracle. It’s a shame you couldn’t understand that.”

“A shame?”

“Yes. It’s not my intention to harm you. But the power that transformed you is from the Nether’s envoy. I still doubt whether you are fully human.”

Meiya and the crimson-winged Celestials all saw a vision of destruction.

And the following revelation, the touch of God, was undoubtedly the power of the Nether [a realm of dark magic and evil entities].

Would those corrupted by this power remain sane in the future? In fact, Meiya was always consumed by hostility and madness towards Azadin, and it was only after being defeated and captured that she was able to stabilize somewhat.

“I sympathize with what happened to you.”

Azadin finished questioning Meiya.

And at the same time, Meiya’s body began to stiffen.

“Ugh?! This is absurd…”

The Elemental Wailing accelerated.

*********

“That damn…”

Azadin came out after finishing his interrogation with Meiya.

“Your Majesty! All the prisoners…”

Starting with Meiya’s petrification, other corrupted Celestials simultaneously went berserk with Elemental Wailing.

“Agh!”

Suddenly, magic stones grew, and the entire underground prison of Bissen transformed into something like a crystal cave.

The guards were so surprised that they had to run away.

Azadin also fled to the stairs to avoid the magic stones of the Elemental Wailing that were attacking him.

“Good heavens…”

“What’s going on?”

Not only the underground prison but also in various parts of the city, the final outbreak of Elemental Wailing began in the places where the corrupted Celestials were separately imprisoned.

Transparent magic stones like crystals covered and destroyed buildings as they grew.

“Are you alright, Your Majesty?” Zekt, who had been waiting outside the underground prison, met Azadin and asked.

“Hmph.”

“Why do you ask? Perhaps, though it’s unlikely, are you hurt anywhere?”

“No, it’s just that I was wondering who was responsible for ruining the life of a young lady who was practically a civil servant, who decided to take revenge, while the person responsible is perfectly fine.”

“Huhu. You wouldn’t make a good superior, Your Majesty. If I were a normal human, wouldn’t I feel rebellious the moment you said that to me? Isn’t it just a waste of time, an emotional fight that doesn’t earn you a single coin, and only makes more enemies?”

Zekt subtly threatened Azadin.

However, Azadin was not swayed by Zekt’s words.

“So, Zekt, you also made enemies by doing whatever you wanted without earning a single coin. When Lord Meiya and the Bissen guys betrayed you, they must have been driven by emotion, right?”

“That’s certainly true. I’m also reflecting on the fact that I’m still young.”

Zekt replied with a sly grin.

“Anyway, what’s clear is that the being who turned them into Celestials sees Your Majesty as a thorn in their side. If they rebelled in a place like Bissen, they would have no future, so why did they rebel…”

Bissen was a mining city that could not be self-sufficient, so it could not survive without trade.

The reason why they rebelled against the Banreung Kingdom, one of the few trade routes, was because those who received revelations from the being called the Great One regarded Azadin as some kind of demon king.

“I’m envious. The fact that evil beings fear Your Majesty so much means that Your Majesty is truly a divine king chosen by the Yaegas spirits, doesn’t it?”

“Is that something to be happy about?”

“Isn’t that why they were deceived by that shallow revelation in the first place? No one dislikes revelations, choices, and prophecies that make them feel special and different from others.”

“I’m not particularly pleased. I need to leave this place, Bissen, as soon as possible and return to the kingdom.”

The problem was that Azadin didn’t have anyone he could trust to leave this place to.

It took a day to occupy this city, but it would take much longer to assess the supplies and handle the aftermath.

The governor and officials who had participated in the rebellion had to be investigated and tried, and a new ruler had to be appointed.

There was no one he could trust to handle these tasks.

Someone like Selim, whose loyalty was certain, did not have the ability to manage a city or check ledgers, and those who did have such abilities, like Zekt or the Messenger Clan, were difficult to trust.

‘Seraph is capable and flexible. It would be great if I could entrust the city to him, but this place is already full of animosity, and if I appoint a Messenger Clan member as governor, there will be chaos. If I want to entrust a Messenger Clan talent with governing duties, I need to do it after things have stabilized. I also need to consider the possibility of public sentiment turning against me if food supply issues arise.’

For these reasons, Azadin was struggling with the aftermath of Bissen.

It was good that his forces had grown rapidly, but he was suffering from a shortage of talent.

But then…

“It’s a disaster! Your Majesty!” A messenger came to find Azadin.

“…It’s always a disaster, isn’t it?” Azadin, who was used to hearing bad news from messengers, scoffed.

Azadin had already experienced the assassination of King Karnago IV of Arangi. There was no reason to be surprised by ordinary events.

But this time, it was different.

“Count Ibechek has been assassinated!”

“What?”

That was definitely a big deal. Count Ibechek of Sandokar was a count in name and a descendant of the Yaegas gods [ancient deities of the land], not a weak person at all.

But an assassination?

“Who was the assassin?”

“It’s the female bandit Camilla! She led a werewolf unit, captured Sandokar, and massacred Count Ibechek’s entire family!”

“……”

Azadin clicked his tongue at those words.

He had known from the beginning that the female bandit Camilla was hiding something, that she was a member of the Wild Magic followers called the Witch Coven [a group of magic users who practice forbidden magic].

However, Azadin believed that she could control herself, transcending the Witch Coven’s orders, regardless of her origins.

Of course, he had also sent her to Saint Mallory, the headquarters of the Rescue Knights, to gather information there, rather than placing her in Naisandokar or Sandokar, where the power of Wild Magic was strong.

Regardless of whether he trusted her or not, Azadin, who was at odds with Shade Hag [a powerful witch], could be attacked by the Wild Magic forces at any time.

That was the choice he made.

But for her to leave the position Azadin had assigned her and kill Count Ibechek?

The ‘Great Being,’ who was clearly a Nether god, created the crimson-winged Celestials and ordered them to stop Azadin, to rebel within Azadin’s territory.

And the betrayal of Camilla, who was from the Wild Magic’s Witch Coven.

In this situation where humanity’s existence on the continent was at its limit, supernatural forces were simultaneously antagonizing Azadin, and a fierce storm was brewing.